Overview
- Salon on December 1 highlights fundamentalist influencer Allie Beth Stuckey as a central driver of the modern right’s effort to recast empathy as damaging, a reading echoed by Alternet and Raw Story.
- Stuckey’s “toxic empathy” concept emerged on her Relatable podcast in 2022 and was formalized in her 2024 book, “Toxic Empathy: How Progressives Exploit Christian Compassion.”
- The analysis says she reframes Christian teaching to elevate disciplinary “love” over compassionate concern and promotes creationism along with opposition to LGBTQ rights and gender equality.
- The piece connects her messaging to a broader discourse in which Elon Musk called empathy a civilizational weakness on Joe Rogan’s show, using “suicidal empathy” language associated with marketing professor Gad Saad.
- Critics argue her soft, feminine branding helps make punitive rhetoric feel palatable and provides a rationale that has long been used to excuse bigotry and abuse.